Public health 'general duty' evaluation
This project's final report and evaluation was completed on 30 September 2019
Project approach
The project was undertaken in stages.
Stage 1
Surveying Environmental Health Officers (EHOs), team leaders and managers within environmental health sections in local government about their use of the General Duty. The survey was created using Qualtrix® and disseminated using the EHA(SA) emailing list. The approach was approved by the Flinders University Social and Behavioural Ethics Research Committee (Approval 8053). The survey questions can be found in Appendix 1. The survey was open for three months.
Stage 2
Following the survey, a series of face to face or telephone semi structured interviews were undertaken with selected survey respondents. This included participants who had indicated that they had used the General Duty and as well as others who indicated that they had not. Several additional individuals (identified through contacts) who demonstrated expertise in the use of the General Duty were also interviewed at this stage. This included lawyers servicing local governments and EHOs from both state and local government.
This stage explored issues around the use of the General Duty and when it has been used successfully. SA Health provided all reports from 2014-2018 submitted by councils of section 92 notices issued. These reports do not clearly separate s 92 General Duty issued to secure compliance with regulations or policies from those issued under the General Duty, but as the report requires a “summary of the matters that section 92 notices were issued to deal with” it was possible to determine, in most cases, the notices issued for compliance with the General Duty.
This provided a comparison with the answers given in the survey and interviews and allowed an estimate of the extent of the use of the General Duty across South Australia. Interviews were transcribed into Microsoft Word® and entered into NVIVO® software (a qualitative data analysis package).
All quantitative data was analysed and/or graphed using Microsoft Excel®. This allowed the researchers to determine which councils across SA are using the General Duty, under what circumstances problems and successes associated with the use of the General Duty and what further training in the use of the General Duty is required.
Project outputs and outcomes
The final outcome of the project was the development of a workshop collating the outcomes of the project, including case studies and examples, to be delivered by the researchers and invited speakers. The workshop will be delivered at Flinders in the City, 182 Victoria Square, Adelaide, on Monday 3rd February 2020. Parts of the workshop will be recorded to form the basis of an online package that will be made available to EHOs, team leaders and managers that cannot attend in real time or would like to have access to refresher resources.
This is be advertised and the report disseminated through Environmental Health Australia, the body representing Environmental Health Officers in South Australia, through the EHA Managers’ Forum and via local government emails. The project was undertaken by Harriet Whiley and Kirstin Ross from Flinders University, and Nicole Moore, City of Onkaparinga, Nadia Conci, Eastern Health Australia, and Rebecca Burton, Berri Barmera Council.
As outlined above, the project identified which councils across SA are using the General Duty, under what circumstances, problems and successes associated with the use of the General Duty and what further training in the use of the General Duty is required. A workshop has been developed to address the needs of EHOs in order to increase the use of the General Duty when appropriate and to increase the confidence of EHOs to do so.
Final written report
A report that summarises the outcomes (in PowerPoint format) to be presented to EHOs as part of the workshop.
A workshop to address the needs of EHOs in order to increase the use of the General Duty when appropriate and to increase the confidence of EHOs to do so.
Project distribution
The workshop is to be advertised and the report disseminated through Environmental Health Australia, the body representing Environmental Health Officers in South Australia, through the EHA Managers’ Forum and via local government emails. The support of the LGA R&DS will be acknowledged at these workshops.
Performance measures
Performance measures in the short term are the number of people responding to the survey and participating in the interviews. Success can be demonstrated in these measures and validity of the survey and interviews was established by comparing the answers given in our study compared with the information as reported to SA Health. A longer term measure of success will be the number of people and a broad representation of councils attending the workshop. The final measure of success will be the increased use of the General Duty and increased confidence of EHOs to use this tool. This will be established in the next few years.
The result of the evaluation of the effectiveness of the actions undertaken to achieve project outcomes As noted above, success can be demonstrated by performance measures in the short term of the number of people responding to the survey (44) and participating in the interviews (17). these measures and validity of the survey and interviews was established by comparing the answers given in our study compared with the information as reported to SA Health (data from 63 councils from 2014 -2018). Longer term measure of success will be the number of people and a broad representation of councils attending the workshop. The final measure of success will be the increased use of the General Duty and increased confidence of EHOs to use this tool. This will be established in the next few years. The result of the evaluation of the impact of project outcomes on the Local Government sector The Public Health Act 2011, which became operational in March 2013, contains the General Duty (s56), which reads: “A person must take all reasonable steps to prevent or minimise any harm to public health caused by, or likely to be caused by, anything done or omitted to be done by the person.”
The General Duty was designed to allow local government authorised officers (generally EHOs) who, having determined that an activity is a risk to public health (or is likely to cause a risk), to have to power to act (by serving a notice to “secure compliance with the general duty”, or a preliminary notice). This was designed to futureproof the Act, to cover unforeseen public health risks, or to cover those risks for which there were not yet regulatory tools. There was a series of Public Health Act information workshops run by the LGA for EHOs to inform EHOs about the new Public Health Act. Part of these workshops included risk assessment and an overview of the General Duty. At the time there was excitement about the broad nature of the power of the General Duty, but also trepidation about applying an unknown compliance tool (pers comm.).
This project has identified the areas where some EHOs are not confident in applying the General Duty, and importantly, significant difficulties in applying the General Duty (for example the requirement for a Preliminary Notice and difficulties associated with issuing a notice under the Emergency provisions). The workshop we have developed will employ experienced EHOs to address the concerns that have been raised by our research.
The ultimate result will be better and more confident use of the General Duty in appropriate situations and a concomitant protection of public health.
Ratings and comments